U.S. Supreme Court Grants Stay on Early Voting Issue in Ohio
The Washington Post has reported that yesterday five of the U.S. Supreme Court Justices agreed to enter an Order granting the State of Ohio’s Application for Stay and Request for Preliminary Injunction to stop enforcement of a court order preventing implementation of Ohio’s plan to reduce early voting. Earlier this year, the State of Ohio’s legislature enacted a plan to reduce the number of early voting days from 35 to 28. Opponents of the law argue that the reduced number of early voting days will discourage voter turn-out. This matter came before U.S. District Court Judge Peter C. Economous earlier this month. He ruled against the State reasoning that the poor and persons of color are disproportionately negatively impacted by the reduction in early voting days because these populations tend to vote early and in-person more often than white voters. Justices Ginsburg, Breyer, Sotomayor, and Kagan would have denied the application for stay.